A/N: Aaaand we're back! Hello again, everyone, i hope you've had a pleasant November? I, at least, will be enjoying another round of games for Rivalry Week!
Thank you for reading, and please enjoy chapter twenty-three!
Winter Schnee's office was sparse and intimidating: the walls bereft of decoration, the room featuring only two chairs separated by a single desk crowded with precisely stacked forms. Winter Schnee stood behind that desk, glaring across the room.
Pyrrha suddenly felt very small.
The four of them lined up, soldiers under review, and waited for the woman to acknowledge them.
"You would be Team JNPR, then?" They nodded nervously. "Which, in turn, would make you Jaune Arc." She could hear Jaune gulp. The woman waved for them to come closer, and the four approached in lock step. Winter Schnee's arms remained clasped behind her back, tired yet ice-cold eyes watching them, watching Jaune. "Going off my little sister's early letters from Beacon, I should set you straight. Harshly."
Pyrrha was reaching for her powers in an instant, a dark glow surrounding hands also held behind herself.
"However, her later letters convince me Weiss would be displeased at my threatening one of her friends, so I suppose I will spare you. I trust you will not… bother… my sister again?" A single brow arched as she watched him. Jaune nodded his head slowly. "Good. Now, why is it that you wish to see me?"
The four of them remained frozen. The imposing woman's eyebrow rose higher, and Pyrrha discreetly elbowed Jaune's side, to shake him from his paralyzed state. He jumped slightly at the contact, but soon was fumbling in his bag.
"O-our team is really close to Weiss', and we just spent a couple weeks in Patch with them." Jaune stood, gripping a set of letters in his hand. "Weiss' partner, Ruby, wanted me to give these to you. One's for you, but the others are for Weiss." He held them to her, trying to keep as much distance between himself and the terrifying woman as possible. Winter accepted them, efficiently but unhurriedly opening the letter addressed to her. She slid the remaining two letters into an unseen pocket.
"Ruby thought you'd be able to get her letters to Weiss. Securely." Jaune said, emphasizing the last to ensure the elder Schnee really understood.
"Without your father reading them."
"Killing the messenger is also frowned upon." Winter muttered, her eyes skipping along the letter. No one had been privy to the details, but Pyrrha could recall Ruby spending a great deal of time perfecting her letter to Winter. Nora shuffled uneasily to her left, Jaune had broken out in a sweat to her right.
Ren was standing at ease, the tension of the room rolling over him. A clock set on the desk loudly ticked away in the quiet room as Winter read the missive.
The older woman stepped back behind her desk, rifling through a lower drawer for a moment before withdrawing a stoppered vial of dust. "Miss Rose failed to include her contact information: if she is within the kingdom, may I have it?" She poured a small amount of red dust onto the paper, which promptly caught fire.
"Oh dear, Ruby, what have you gotten yourself into?" Pyrrha fretted as she approached Winter with her scroll outstretched. The elder Schnee held her own scroll out, receiving Ruby's information as she swept the ashes of the letter into the nearby bin.
"This is certainly not how I expected this meeting to go, but if you will excuse me? Vale won't save itself, let alone Mistral." It was clearly a dismissal, and none of JNPR felt quite up to challenging it.
"It was a pleasure to meet you, Specialist Schnee." Pyrrha added, withdrawing to the safety of her team.
"To you as well, Miss Nikos." And the woman finally smiled, if barely. The barest hint of warmth through the weary cold. "Best of luck to you."
Stepping out of the office, JNPR silently, quickly, made their way back to the lobby and the waiting Blanche. Her dark green and black was a shout of contrast surrounded by Atlas' white and greys. Her stern, military mask cracked a bit spotting them, but she maintained it as she escorted them back through the checkpoint and onto the streets. Once they were beyond earshot of the building, Blanche's posture shifted back to a woman, albeit a dangerous one, ambling down the road.
"It's kinda terrifying how fast you can do that." Nora said, with a bit of giggle in her words. Blanche smiled benevolently at them.
"You should see Dad do it: can shift his voice on a dime. Has my little Jaune started doing it yet? Pulled out a 'team leader' voice on you?" She tried to ruffle Jaune hair, which he once again dodged, and Pyrrha smiled at the sibling byplay.
"Yup!" Nora said, popping the word for all it's worth. Before Jaune could interject, Pyrrha fired in.
"I think it's quite impressive: the sign of a good leader." Jaune's suspicious glare at Nora turned into a pleased smile for her, which sent her stomach alight, as that smile always did. She was less than pleased at Blanche's eye roll, but the woman was trying to keep her word.
"So, where am I leading you all now? Have any other mysterious, apparently classified meetings I can lead you to?" Jaune shook his head rapidly, though.
"It's not like that, sis! We were just dropping off a letter!" Blanche didn't look convinced, however. Jaune hung his shoulders at her suspicion. "No, we were going to go meet with Pyrrha's mother next: we're staying with her."
"You've got a place in Vale?" Blanche asked, turning towards Pyrrha.
"Not quite: Mother is renting a house in the western edge of the Residential District. She told me in our last call that the team could stay there easily enough, so we decided to save Beacon some hassle."
It also kept JNPR separated from the elder teams, who may start questioning why a single set of first years were back, as Jaune had pointed out in their team meeting prior to accepting. She and Jaune had debated their accommodations, it was certainly not an argument, but she knew it was the right choice in the end.
"Alright, well let's get you guys a ride, then." The elder Arc declared, while Pyrrha braced herself for their next meeting.
Stepping through the door, Jaune was immediately greeted by a familiar voice. "Jaune, Ren, Nora, it's so good to see you!" Pyrrha's mother was upon them in an instant.
Thetis Nikos was not a tall woman, Marron was already her height, nor did she have Pyrrha's green eyes, but her hair was as brilliant a red as his girlfriend's. Retired, Thetis had lost most of a Huntress' build over the years, and the tremor in her grip when she took his hands made it clear she would not return to true active duty. Her hair was still swept to the side, covering the remaining scars of the injury which ended her career.
"It's wonderful to see you all again, of course! And Pyrrha!" The woman ushered them all in before sweeping by and taking hold of her daughter, clasping both hands over hers. "It's so wonderful to see you again, dear! I know we talked about it, but I was so worried!" The group made their way inside, settling down in the living room.
The house was well kept, but Jaune couldn't help but notice the lack of feeling it had. It made sense, this was a rental after all, but it still put him just a hair off balance. Thetis took a seat in the lone chair, while Nora dashed over to sprawl on the couch, plopping Ren down at the far end. Pyrrha and he took the loveseat, and he pretended that their sitting there wasn't some arcane scheme of Nora's. Instead of confronting those concerns, he took up a cracker and some cheese from the platter on the table.
"How are you all doing, how were Patch and those girls?" Thetis was leaning forward eagerly, watching Pyrrha and himself with a hawkish eye.
"Patch was pleasant, mother. Team RWBY are doing well, all things considered. Ruby and Yang actually took us out to a fair in Patchwork before we left, it was quite nice." Jaune remembered an out of the way section of a mirror maze and an hour stuck atop a Ferris Wheel, and suddenly found himself repressing a blush. Mrs. Nikos had focused in on Nora and Ren by then, thankfully.
"And how have you two been doing? I hope all this unpleasantness hasn't dimmed your demeanor, Nora?" Nora, feet across Ren's lap and head on a cushion, shook her head.
"No worries, Mrs. Nikos, nothing's gonna keep me down." She jutted a thumb towards Pyr and he. "And I'll keep them going too, if I gotta!" She flashed a winning smile, and Thetis laughed.
"Oh, I have missed you, Nora. Ren, I trust you're well?"
Ren nodded, hand resting atop Nora's ankles as if it were perfectly normal. "For Ren, it is…"
"Of course, ma'am, thank you."
The older woman leaned back into her chair, relaxing. "Dear, what brings all of you to Vale? Surely not just me."
"Headmistress Goodwitch wanted to speak with us about the events of the Fall." Pyrrha said easily, also settling back in her seat. Jaune smirked a bit, seeing them unconsciously take the same pose: legs crossed and stretched forward, open hands atop each other.
"We also managed to convince the Headmistress to allow us to stay and help with Vale, if we can." Ren continued, taking up their cover. "Vale's much safer, as you know, and Goodwitch trusted our team to be safer than the others." In spite of his own weaknesses, Jaune knew JNPR were considered one of the best first year teams in Beacon, arguably the best with RWBY in its current state.
"I'm sure you all will be careful, but I've no doubt JNPR can handle whatever comes their way." Thetis declared with utter conviction, to which Nora agreed with a short whoop. Jaune laughed a bit, so did Pyrrha, and he leaned back in his cushion beside her.
The talk grew mundane for a while: how Thetis was settling in, what Bar had been like. Easy, relaxing talk after long mornings of travel and work. Pyrrha had seemed nervous on the ride over, but now, while Nora regaled Thetis with stories of his family, she had relaxed against his side, all tension relieved. Ren cleared his throat before Nora could detail a marksmanship lesson with Verte he did not remember.
"May I ask what led to your decision to come to Vale, Thetis?" Ren asked. The older woman hummed a moment, then held up a trembling hand.
"I may not be a reliable shot anymore, Ren, but I still have eyes. I can still hold a spear in a pinch, as well. Will I be picking off Creeps from a moving bullhead? No, but I can help, even if it's only a patrol. I'll not be left aside, I'll tell you!" She brought the hand back down then, letting out a small sigh.
"Though, if some of the rumors are to be believed, Mistral could have used some extra hands as of late." He felt Pyrrha stiffen against his side, but Mrs. Nikos made a calming gesture to her daughter. "Nothing Mistral can't handle, dear. Simply more than expected, that's all." Pyrrha and her mother exchanged glances, but his partner eventually settled back against him.
"What about your training? I hope you've kept up your regimen." Mrs. Nikos was watching them again, like his own mother had when she thought he'd been up to something. It was unnerving. He felt the need to make sure he hadn't hidden his sister's toys anywhere.
"Yes, Mother: Jaune and I even increased our normal training time by nearly double." It wasn't exactly a lie, as they'd been told to stay quiet on Pyrrha's powers.
"You have? I do hope you haven't been pushing Jaune too far." She faced him briefly, "You're a wonderful young man, Jaune, but I'm sure you understand more than anyone the level of skill Pyrrha has reached." He mildly agreed. Pyrrha was amazing, and he understood Thetis might be worried the skill gap would be detrimental for training. He felt Pyrrha's grip tighten on his though. When had she taken his hand?
"Jaune has grown tremendously, mother, and he's been an exceptional help to me. I wouldn't have anyone other than Jaune." Jaune smiled at the sentiment, but then he noticed Pyrrha's expression: why her interview smile?
Thetis was quiet for a moment longer than what seemed necessary, then she let out a quiet chuckle, pushing herself out of the chair. "Well, you don't need me pestering you every moment, dear. Let's get all of your things to your rooms, yes?" The five of them made their way back to the hall, Pyrrha not releasing his hand and Nora assembling a small tower from the cheese plate.
Their rooms were on the right side of the house, two small bedrooms and an adjoined bathroom. The spaces were narrow, but that was just the limits of Vale, nothing looked bad. Jaune dropped his tight-packed bags and settled his guitar more carefully before he crashed down on his bed, confirming it was in fact much nicer than his mattress at school or home.
"I'll be on shift for most of the afternoon, dear, so I'll meet you there for dinner, alright?" Jaune heard Thetis informing the girls in the other room, while Ren touched down on his own bed. The planning reminded him of his father, though, and Jaune rose from his place.
"Mrs. Nikos?" Jaune called as he recovered Ren's dress shirt. Ren himself was setting out the ironing board.
"You can still call me Thetis, Jaune." The woman responded, rounding the corner and resting on the doorframe.
"My father is in town as well, and he was hoping to have dinner with my team…" Thetis had invited them a few days ago, and he felt bad about intruding with a plus one.
"No worries, Jaune: another chaperone to keep an eye on you kids is hardly the end of the world. Let him know he can come along, I'll pass along the address to you."
"Thanks, Thetis."
The older woman drifted off, then, leaving the two boys to prepare in peace.
Or at least, he thought in peace. Pyrrha rounded the corner not a minute later, heeled boots landing with more force than normal for her. Looking up to her, no anger was plain on her face, but her eyes told a different story.
"Jaune, what are you planning on wearing?" She asked without preamble. He hadn't really thought about it, just gone looking for an outfit.
"I wasn't sure…" He suspected Pyrrha had something in mind already. Sure enough, she crouched down next to the bags, helping him sort through.
"May I?" He nodded his assent. The bag was quickly emptied, his clothes laid out on the bed as Pyrrha studied the clothes. "I think that turtleneck… maybe this? No, no. And these pants, the jacket too…" She was turning through the admittedly limited set of clothes with a thoughtful expression, and he found himself grinning ear to ear; Pyrrha had a plan in mind, and she was making sure it went off without a hitch. He always felt like he just winged it, but she was always so thoughtful in her action, always considering the results. His mood dimmed, though: "Always, except once..."
He suppressed the glum feeling, reminding himself that moment had led to all of this. A little bit of pain for them gave them a lot of joy.
She laid out what she thought was right, then flushed a tad. "Oh, I'm sorry Jaune, I didn't ask if-" he cut her off with a light peck.
"I trust you, Pyr, you know that." A grin close to his own flashed back, and she returned to sort out her own clothes.